I’d like to give you some flavor of the novel which I’m in the final stages of preparing for publication through Smashwords in ebook form. Whew! That was a mouthful. The title of the novel is Wanderer Come Home.
Our main character is 70-year-old Axel Browne. The story takes place in 2018 and early 2019. Axel is a veteran of the Vietnam War and served in 1967-1968 and was wounded the day before the famous Tet Offensive by the North Vietnamese Army. But this is not a war story. So there you have the broad strokes which define our Axel Browne. Oh, but I forgot one important thing: Upon returning home from the war, Axel could not reenter society in the traditional sense which means he had no desire to live the way most Americans live—with careers, bills, mortgages, and the rest. Instead, he decided to become a wanderer—a homeless person who travels wherever his boots take him.
This type of life suited Axel well, however, because he was in search of something—or, I should say, someone—but even his friends did not know this about him. He did not tell them about his search because, first of all, it was a very personal thing and, second, if he discussed it with anyone, they would probably think him touched, or something. Now, at the beginning of our story, Axel realizes he’s probably already lost whatever opportunity he might have had, over his lifetime, of finding the girl for whom he has searched so long. Oh, did I say “girl”? Well, okay then, that’s right. He has looked for a girl who, of course, now, would be a mature woman in her late fifties.
But there’s a second character who enters our story early on. His name is Hunter Carr. He’s in his late forties, happily married, and has been speedily climbing the ladder-to-success. As the story opens, Hunter has reached the pinnacle of his career, to date, when, in a freak accident, he drowns in his own swimming pool. With the drowning, he experiences what people call: “a near death experience” or NDE. He revives from the drowning but the NDE messes up his perceptions of reality, success, and life in general. Everyone who matters to Hunter, of course, wants him to “recover” which means they want him to return to the same person he was before the pool accident. The problem is he can’t.
Axel and Hunter do meet eventually under unusual circumstances. But both men change the other’s life, unknowingly and profoundly, even before they meet in person for the first time.
It’s a story about how some of our mundane, everyday decisions accumulate to have life changing consequences. But we never know which decisions change our fate or if they are somehow predestined. And when our lives are changed profoundly, what do we do then?
See you around the block.
